Um let's start our meeting.

Uh today we are going to talk about uh DFR, which is drone as first responders.

It has been an item that has been sitting in front of us for a while for consideration.

Today I'm joined by my colleague Pat Hogan, Martinave, Rita Penawa, President Helen Hudson, myself, Rashida Codwell, uh Jimmy Manto, and Patrol Red Joe Rouser.

Uh and we are also joined by uh Deputy first Deputy Chief Uh Shaw and the whole team is here, I see, and they look excited.

Um so welcome.

And and today, Chief, is it's just to revisit our conversation before.

I don't know if you have any anything you want to say first, or should we just no, I have I would like to have the opportunity to say.

If we don't mind.

Um appreciate the opportunity uh for letting me come in.

I came to the uh public hearing last night.

And uh I we all listened to it, so we heard it, and there's a couple things, and we've had these discussions that um we'll can we can we're willing to make some changes to put in some safeguards uh for some of the issues that were raised last night.

And I'll get to those here in a second.

Um but first uh let you know that the current drone program, not the drone as a first responders.

Some of the successes we had just about a month ago or so.

There was an incident where a man was uh a couple calls came in where man had what appeared to be a long gun.

Um he was down in the area of Gettys and Van Rancelet.

The patrol officers put the drone up, we're able to assist in tracking the man to the mall.

And once he was in the mall, the mall cameras were used, and then seconds that whole thing was brought to a successful conclusion.

Um not to make light of it, but I was playing golf.

I figured I was heading into the building because this is gonna be a big one.

And before I even finish that hall, the the guy was in costume, it was no big deal, there was nothing.

It was it was something saver.

Um there was a brush fire over in the Skunk City area.

It was used to monitor hot spots.

It's very successful with that.

And then the last thing I'd like to point out as far as assistant of the fire department is there was the Maria Regina.

We were able to help them more uh accurately deploy their water cannons and onto the proper places in the thing.

So that helped it.

Not drones of first responder, but drones in general.

Criminal investigations have been used in multiple gun recoveries, recovered stolen vehicles without pursuits.

And also the drones being used in the ATV program, which I'm sure all the council are getting a lot of complaints about the ATVs racing all over the city.

Those are also done without the need of a pursuit, right?

Like we can use the drones to follow them to where the where where the perpetrators go, they can be safely stopped and ticketed and it prevents a lot of issues.

So the pillars of the drone program in general is to uh improve police response to calls for service to enhance the efficient use of uh police and city resources, uh to provide real-time situational awareness, and to support and de-escalate incidents.

Um as a result of the meeting last night and some of the conversations, uh, counselor joke that you and I've had.

Um, I've provided you and President Hudson with with the current policy.

Um, we talked uh after the meeting last night where we want to build in some more safeguards, I think.

Um doesn't change what we want to do with the program, but it will, I think, assure uh build some more public uh confidence and trust in what we're doing.

Um so last night um we are in the process of amending uh 606.6 of the policy, uh which is the use of the UAS on manned air systems to reflect supervisor approval prior to the use of each drone, uh, which would be at the level of a commanding officer.

Um we've which is a lieutenant or a captain.

We we had that discussion.

You want a high-level person to make that decision.

We also would like to consider building in if it's not a lieutenant or captain, a sergeant who does have the part 10 107a license that is FAA certified, so that we keep an eye on that.

Um it's not either or is it that's what you could be the only one?

It's a open for discussion.

We're willing to go either way.

Okay, we think it'd be more efficient if we did both.

Okay, but if it's just the commander, we can do that too.

Yeah, um uh 606.7 of the policy.

Uh we'll mandate that the drone as a first responder will not be uh used for random patrols.

It's currently not in there.

We will put that in there.

Um drones will not be used to monitor protest activities, uh, absent and articulable uh danger to safety or uh to the public interest.

Chief, where would that protest activity?

It was uh 606.7.

Right.

Okay.

So it can go that's the old policy.

That's the old policy.

Right, the new policy.

It's not in there, we'll got you.

These are these are and you know, when we talk about that protest clause, I'm looking at 606.6 K.

The you define well, you don't define what you have an object for special events.

Um then you've got M UAS, you know, again that generic enhanced public safety clause, and then P mutual aid support.

And I'm wondering if protest activity can or will fall under KMRP, what we might do in that scenario.

So special events, we're thinking football games, basketball games, concerts, Clinton Square.

Um, but we're gonna put in the other policy.

I just lost my spot there.

Um we're gonna put in there that that is specifically prohibited.

The drones of first responder to be using in protest.

So that will be added.

Yeah, you know, I can think of it in a world where a protest would be considered a special event.

That'd be a little too cute, but here it's gonna specifically say protest.

Okay.

And you know, I think we're trying to avoid cuteness here.

Yes.

Well, chief, just you know, let's parse a little bit about that.

A protest might be a situation where a drone could be used to safeguard the people we're protesting, couldn't it?

Not the drone as a first responder.

If we had nothing that we can't see with our own two eyes from where we are already, so the drone is the first responder would be something that would be used remotely, right?

That's the whole idea.

Is it it can be flown remotely?

The officers uh can review it from uh the public safety building to get to the calls for the protests.

We're putting on the table that we are not gonna use the drones and first responder for that.

Any type of cameras that would be used in a situation, it would the officers would already have to be able to see it.

Okay, because I would just think well, like the and the protests that happened downtown with all the high buildings and everything else, and maybe somebody doesn't like that protest.

I mean, I could see using a drone to maybe safeguard the protesters or not.

So that I mean that's kind of the danger when you're putting limitations on about the protest, right?

Yeah, because that would be a perfectly good use for a drone, is to be able to see on top of buildings, right?

Because we all know that that's what's been happening lately.

We've had a couple of major incidents in the last year where people or snipers are on top of buildings.

Um I don't want to give away all our tactics, but outside of the use of drones, we already checked those things, but it would be a definite nice tool to have.

And are you taping protest activity?

You know, video recording of individuals.

All the stuff in the in the drone is recorded.

It's put onto a uh SIM drive, and then we collect it and we put it onto evidence.com, at which point it goes the same place as our body warrant cameras.

What's the duration of it?

What's the duration of it?

How long is it?

Can we record?

How long now?

How long can you record?

But how long do you keep it?

Retention.

Well, we have a retention policy.

I don't know exactly, I think it's 30 days generally speaking.

Unless it's evidence, if it's evidence, then we we'll have to keep it based on the retention policy law.

So if we had evidence it was a homicide, we'd keep it forever.

If it was a misdemeanor, I think you keep it for two years.

Um, but there's laws on how long you retain any records.

Could would you share that with us as well just to see what's in the time frame of retention?

Sure.

Share that as well.

I are you done with your presentation, Chief?

Um I had a couple more things to go, but if you could wait, just hold with our question, let the chief go through with his presentation and I'm almost done.

Okay.

I'm on like five and six to go.

I just want to check with Sergeant Einbeck.

Sergeant, did you have any more to add about the retention time frame?

Am I off base on there?

Does that sound about right?

Yes, correct.

Okay.

Sergeant Ibeck Technology Division.

The retention policy follows our body cam policy retention.

Which the chief just mentioned.

Um the SD cards are uploaded into evidence.com.

So it will follow the retention policy that is for the body cam policy as well.

So where's evidence.com store?

It's it's in the cloud.

Oh, yeah.

So how could how can you statute that it's capable, you just log into our evidence.com platform and you can you can uh see the evidence.

So then you can delete it once you need to.

We don't delete it.

It's followed on the evidence retention policy.

So say a parking ticket is recorded on a body cam, that's held for at least a minimum of three years.

So it's it's a high retention policy.

Um acts on follows our retention policy that we put in place.

So when it comes upon the three-year mark, it'll go through our evidence and automatically delete it out.

Three years.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And one of the questions and concerns that came up last night was uh one of the commenters had made the comment that uh Axon has the ability to use their data basically as you see fit.

We spoke to the representative this morning and they provided us uh the highlighted language in the contract that says that this is our data, and that um to cut to the end that they can't be shared with anybody unless it's performing troubleshooting maintenance or diagnostic screenings and enforce the agreements of this policy, which means they can't get our data to anybody.

And then um I've mentioned this before.

This is a real quick one that uh there will be before if approved before this program gets off the ground, there will be a dashboard on our website where everybody can see how often the drone flew, where it flew, what the flight pattern was, what the nature of the call was.

That dashboard will be up before we get it up and running.

And the last thing I'd like to add is that you know, uh this is going on with other agencies.

Uh the Suego County Sheriff's Office um has got it up and running.

I offered the members of this body, I hope you guys saw it the ability to view that if you would like that.

They're willing to come to Syracuse to show, uh, show you all how it works, or we could take a field trip to Fulton to see how it works.

Um, so that that offer still stands.

And I don't know if you heard yesterday that the uh county executive says he's putting a bunch of money uh into the sheriff's department, and a significant portion of that is gonna be for a DFR program.

Yeah.

Would you before we get into question?

Would you just you know take us back a little bit and talk about why you want this program?

Just just general point by point.

So before we get into it, it goes with the uh points that I put out on uh page uh page one of the document here.

Um the for of the pillars of the program, right?

But that we uh will improve police response to calls for service.

Do you want I can give you an example?

Um, for example, uh the one that everybody uses, and it's an extreme example, but another agency had a call where uh there was a report of a man with a gun in the park.

Uh the drone is the first responder went out there.

Now, if the officers come to that call of a man in the gun with a park sitting on a bench, but he's got displaying a gun, you're gonna go in there with height intentions, height and awareness, and you're gonna be at this level.

The drone is the first responder went out there, saw that the man was using it to light a cigarette, but it's just level just went from here to here, right?

So another use of efficiency would be the example I gave you about the the mall or um the the fire Maria Regina assists in the fire department.

We can use it to go over wooded areas, right, that are hard to see.

There's thermal imaging on it, where if there was a lost person, a missing child, anything along those lines, you can see that on a heat map.

Um it's just gonna uh provide real-time situational awareness, which is the example I just gave.

And also, and that also points to the de-escalation, right?

So situationally, the officers realize it's only a lighter, and it also de-escalates at the same time.

So that's that's our purpose for the program.

So, do we have do we expect to have like a list of criteria for calls that we'll use it for first versus it's is someone gonna be deciding that on the fly, like oh, this one looks good, or is there gonna be a list of calls that say, okay, this is where we put the drone up?

So we already have a policy on priorities, and so it would have to follow that, right?

Somebody wanted to use it to go check uh a loud party that's two hours old to see if it's still going on versus uh a shots fired just came in, uh it's going with the shots fired.

That we already have a policy on that.

So loud party in someone's backyard, we could put the drone over the backyard.

A fence yard, we could put the drone over the yard.

If we're looking for a loud party, uh currently we could.

Um, yes.

What do we do now if someone's having a large party?

Do we do we have the right to go into the backyard?

We wouldn't go into the back.

Well, yeah, if if they refuse to stop and they're committing a crime, we we could, yeah, we could enter.

I think Chief's gonna wait for a little bit, but I think where counselor Monto is going.

It's the shift in the policy in section three.

You know, you talked about amending section six and section seven.

Um, when we pull out a copy of the drone policy from 2022, is the data I have on here.

Yes, um, it includes the clause that reads, and I quote, absence a warrant or exigent circumstances.

Operators and observers shall adhere to FAA L T regulations and shall not intentionally record or transmit images of any location where a person would have a reasonable expectation of privacy, e.g.

residence, yard or enclosure.

That clause got modified to read that quote personnel will consider the protection of individual civil liberties.

Um we heard that clause in the absence of the you know of that statement.

We had heard that identified as an issue by a number of individuals last night.

Um, you know, I know that that concerns counselor Monto and myself as well.

Um it feels like we had it leads to a fairly robust statement of privacy that is now watered down, and a lot of the privacy protections to the residents are absent in that clause.

So we definitely wouldn't be able to use the drone to look in somebody's backyard without uh probable cause or reasonable cause to believe that that there's something going on.

We're not gonna be able to fly over and see what's going on in the in Rich Shop's backyard.

That's clearly prohibited.

But if we had a call for the loud party, right?

Maybe a big fight or something like that in the backyard, maybe even weapons display, we would we would guess.

And what if the the call came in three blocks down the road and they're flying over your yard on the way to get there?

The camera will not be uh down in recording on its on its flight, right?

The camera uh will be looking out or up.

You don't want to look down because that tends to make you want to go down.

It's like riding a motorcycle.

You look where you want to go.

So if we get there and nothing's going on, we would delete that footage that day.

Uh I don't know the answer to that.

I don't think so.

I think it would still be putting the evidence.com, and here's the reason.

That's pretty cool.

Somebody calls in and says you were looking in my backyard, say it was two doors down or three doors down.

We would be able, I want to be able to pull that footage back up and look to see what what they were actually looking at.

Where they did it go down three doors ahead of time.

Also keep in mind that if if a complaint comes in and the complaint goes to the civilian review board, they're also gonna have a chance to look at this video and see where it's going.

There will be other people besides the police department that will be reviewing this this footage.

Question for you, Chief.

How do we guarantee that we don't use drones for um profiling?

It's written right in the policy that you can't uh consider race, gender, and all of those profiling type uh type of things, right?

It's right in there on the prohibited use one, which was 607.

Nope.

It's in here somewhere just right at this point.

Yeah, there it is.

Bullet point too.

Can't target a person based solely on actual perceived characteristics, such as race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, or expression, economic status, age, cultural group, or disability.

Okay.

What's the accountability measure on that part?

Say that that that's not followed.

What happened?

And who does it?

Uh we while we have our progressive discipline.

Um it would the person if they violated the policy would be written up, and then everything's taken into consideration at the end of the day, the chief uh makes the final decision, CRB will have a chance to look at it and weigh in on it, and then the chief will make the f final decision on what that discipline is gonna be.

Could be anything from uh a verbal warning uh or an unfounded all the way to a termination, right?

There's everything's in between.

So you are able to have the opportunity as a chief to a betrayal, just review what's happening with with the recorded material, right?

Because what I'm hearing is this discipline will happen when when if if somebody see it, right?

If somebody sees that is external, basically.

But is there a a review mechanism within the department that will proactively review every recorded video to make sure that certainly so we do that with a body more cameras?

I'm not sure, Lieutenant Williams.

Uh do we have it built in that we'll be doing that with the uh drone program?

Or if not, we can clearly add that that there's a random review process being done.

Lieutenant Williams, I oversee emergency management and special events.

I'm sorry, could you just repeat the question?

So I was yeah, uh, you want to.

So he was asking if you know we review uh body war cameras randomly to just to check them.

Would we do we do the same thing with the drone program, or can we build that in?

We are doing it now.

It's not built into the policy.

Happy to add it if that's something you'd like to see.

Um Sergeant Wells and I do review uh periodic flights from time to time on different calls for sure.

I think I think I think it makes sense to be proactive about it rather than waking up and said, Oh shoot, we should have done this, you know, proactively being able to review those videos.

So you know, yeah, trust five.

Yeah, and Counselor Williams, if we can go back to 606.3 just to make a point.

Thank you.

I I do understand and I I see your point.

It's a it's a very good point.

What we did when we rewrote this policy, we took a very outdated policy when drones were very new in the law enforcement world, was our first original policy, and we use some uh gold standards through Calia, the accreditation agency.

They oversee a lot of departments who already have a drone policy now.

We kind of cherry-picked what we felt worked best when we wrote this policy.

So that certainly wasn't intentional to water this down.

Great point.

I see your point.

I'm certainly, I'm sure Chief Schoff and I will talk when we get back on possibly adopting that private.

And you know, when we talk about the gold standard, kind of in the initiative, there's nothing to say that we can go, we can as a city choose to go above and beyond in order to have additional protections for the privacy of our residents.

You know, if the threshold is here, we can go higher.

Yes.

I just wanted to address here, but it's it's a great point, but there was no intent to purposefully water that down.

Uh and and I recognize it, you know, it is slightly watered down.

So I just wanted to say there was no intent to do that on purpose as we were rewriting this new policy from an outdated older policy.

Thank you.

Counselor, if that's what it takes to get this project across the finish line, and assure you that we'll get that in there.

I have one more question.

This may be a little off the cuff, but you said you review it and CRB reviews it, right?

So you know the council does have a public safety committee.

So would it be would they be able to also review the camera, the um drone footage?

I'm sorry, review the flights.

So what what I didn't quite hear the recorded video, yeah.

Would the committee public safety committee also have access to review it just like CRB does as well?

And everybody else.

I don't know the answer to that.

I mean, I'm sure you could see the video, but I don't know if we would we could wouldn't want to do it in a public setting.

The proposal no, no, it wouldn't be.

It doesn't be the members safety committee.

So it's four people.

Yes.

Okay.

Um another thing that kept coming yesterday from everybody that was um up uh for discussion, it's who are we sharing this information with?

Can you tell us a little bit about that?

It's our data we're not sharing.

Who are we sharing with?

We're not sharing it's our data, we're not sharing it with anybody.

Okay.

But but Chief, you know, I asked the law department, I asked Joe Berry this yesterday.

I mean, each case would have to be reviewed on its own merits, but any data held by the city is subject to FOIL or a court order.

Right.

That is true, right?

That's true of any police report, any data, anything.

If a court orders it's you know release or evidence or entered into review, then that would be the case, yes.

In any police policy, is you know, you sharing that data with any other department, like a state department or a federal department, that would be part of your police policy.

So how would you handle that?

Right now, the way the body warrant cameras work is that body more camera data, Lieutenant or Sergeant, but you can correct me if I'm wrong here, but that goes into evidence.com, and um, I think the state attorney general's office has access to it.

We have to give people specific access to get that data.

In other words, nobody's gonna go fishing through it without access given by us.

Is that that's correct, right?

No, we and we have given it to the attorney general's office.

So there's another set of eyes on us.

The other the other question, Chief, in regards to the authorizing authority within within the the department, you said it could be it could be a sergeant, it could be a chief, it could be a lieutenant, you know.

You know, we have a good number of lieutenants in the department sergeants, uh, five chiefs, right?

Total.

I is it going to is that access going to be given to all the leadership, or is there going to be specific people within the leadership so that it's not sporadic in a sense?

So the way it's gonna work in in reality is it's gonna be a uh patrol call, or if it's something else, um it's gonna well it's gonna be a patrol call because the drone is a first responder.

So um there's gonna be a captain and or a lieutenant 24-7 that works.

Um sometimes they might be a little busy or something, and if we were going to extend it to sergeants, it wouldn't be every sergeant.

It would only be the sergeants that have the license to fly the drones.

So if if I'm a sergeant and I don't have it, and you're a sergeant, you do have it, you could make the call, but I couldn't.

But in a perfect world, uh lieutenant or captain can make it, and by default, then the next step up in that organization is all five chiefs, and yes, all five chiefs would be able to make that call.

Okay.

So five chief uh.

What if the chief hasn't had a training?

How do we it's it's just still gonna be based on what the nature of the call is, right?

Okay, we're kind of supposed to have a general grasp of everything that's going on in the department.

Um you don't necessarily need special training, but I've got an awful lot of time digging through these drone policies.

Uh Chief Ross and does.

Chief Cecil is a big drone guy.

Like I think he might own one or two himself.

So we all understand the concepts.

We know what our dispatch policies are, and one we're gonna allow things to be used and one not.

Chief.

I guess following that statement, again, going back to Section 6 M, quote, any time a UAS would enhance public safety.

Can you give me the umbrella, you know, the spectrum of of how you would define enhancement of public safety?

No, you used the gun and park example, and I feel like many of our constituents, when we talk about a DFR program, the gun and park situation is where their mind goes.

Um six or six, yeah.

You know, the gun and park, you know, by by your own admission is not the only situation scenario in which the DFR program would be operational.

Um, again, kind of basing upon feedback we heard last night.

There was pushback on the lower level calls.

Um, and I guess not only the lower level calls, but the shift in language from you know, early discussion around high-level calls, and then it it migrated to the lower level.

And you know, I'm not sure if people actually took issue with the low level or the switch in language.

Yeah, understood.

But again, kind of trying to better understand that concept of any time a drone would enhance public safety.

So that's why you're gonna have a command officer or or deputy chief, even or a sergeant with a knowledge to make that decision, right?

The rest of the policy spells out when you definitely can't.

And so it would have to be outside of that.

You can't go on fishing expeditions.

You have to have a reasonable articulate reason that you're doing something.

This is not a catch-all where you can just do anything you want.

You still have to be able to articulate it, so to be able to defend it.

So it's a standard scrutiny or review.

So Chief, I would look at the surveillance technology working group document that is on your website.

And here there's a quote that says several members of the public also made the point that citizens expect people, not robots, to show up when call when calling the police.

Now I think what this is alluding to is the customer side, customer service side of policing, right?

And I guess my question consider you know, putting this statement into consideration.

And considering that as you send drone, will the officers also follow?

And what what in when do the officers show up to this?

Because I don't know if if once the drone show up and is able to address the situation, you know, somebody is able to be put into control.

So currently where does the officer show up?

So currently there's follow-up phone calls made from 911.

If it's a long time between say it's a low-level call, like a lot of music, and it's been sitting there a long time.

If the drone is the first responder, goes down there and sees that it's not there anymore, then a phone call could be made back to the complainant saying that we've we've checked out, responded that the problem's resolved.

Um certain situations are gonna require a police response anyways.

Um, this is just gonna get us there quicker, get some on the ground intelligence out to the officers arriving to enhance their safety, the public safety.

You kind of know what the layout is, um, speed the call along.

But a lot of calls, even though you're using the drone, are still gonna require human to intercede, right?

A drone can't do a burglary investigation, the drone can't take a report if a report is necessary.

So anything that rises to the level where you're gonna need a report, we're gonna have to make that report happen.

And I think I think, Chief, you know, it it it based on what we are hearing, that any case that require drone would be a high priority case.

No, right necessarily it wouldn't it wouldn't be a high priority case.

No.

So so a low a lower case would so say there there are say there is somewhere in the street, kids are playing music, they're playing ball, and there's a lot of noise, and you get called.

Now, that call maybe you might receive one, two, three from the neighborhood.

Now, would that call, knowing that it's not a threat, it's it's a noise.

Would that require a drone?

Would you require a drone?

But if it's been sitting there a while, you might want to go take a look and see if the kids are still there, right?

Say the call came in at eight o'clock at night, now it's 9 30 and it's dark, and you can't get a whole person to call to verify it.

Maybe you do send the drone and say, look, we can clear that call out of there.

You don't have to send a police officer, the kids went somewhere else.

You know, I think there's also an issue issue I know in a particular uh that plagues my neighborhoods is those gangs of motorcycles, IT ATVs and all that, you know, that obviously the police can't pursue them, but you can follow them where they go and maybe seize them.

I mean, I think that's a that might be relatively low level, but it's a big problem in some of the neighborhoods I I represent.

It costs us a significant amount of man hour and money to definitely the biggest benefit to that is it prevents pursuits, right?

Like we're not already gonna pursue vehicles because we're stolen, but this is gonna prevent somebody from seeing the police if we try to pull over that they take off because they think they're getting stopped, right?

So if we got a drone on them, you quietly find out where they go and then you go grab the illegal vehicle.

Hey Chief, on this one, you're saying you're gonna do high priority and low priority.

So what happens if the drone goes out?

You get a call and someone gives you a call, but the message that they gave you were incorrect, right?

So sometimes somebody might think, oh, it was a fight, but a fight really was something more tragic, right?

And then you get there and the drone gets there.

Every second that the drone is waiting, is preventing the officer to come like a real person.

So, like what protocols are in place for races, you know.

Something like that in progress, you're gonna try to send a police officer if one's available.

So that would be going at the same time.

Hopefully, the drone gets there first, finds out that everybody's gone, uh, oops, they're still fighting, or B, there's a man laying on the ground motionless, and everybody else is gone.

So you'll have that intel before you get there, which would increase the response.

Or if say you didn't have the resources to send it and you put that call out, police officers are gonna put aside whatever they're doing if they can and go to help somebody.

So the drone would be first and then the police would be second.

Or they're gonna sign the things.

So if we dispatch for the motorbike situation that Council Hogan was talking about, is that camera on that drone running as it chases this motorbike all over the city?

So I know you said the camera doesn't come on until we get to the scene of where you're sending it.

But if if you're if you're pursuing a motorbike, motorcycle, crazy golf cart, I don't know, pick a vehicle, but whatever it is, is that the whole time around?

So long these are like 30 or 40 vehicles.

Right, you know, in the point, it would be wise to be recording that whole entire encounter, or if there was an accident, for God forbid it was a serious accident or fatal, you would want that capture if you had that ability to capture it.

And then from the from the uh human side of things, Chief, I um, you know, as again referencing the surveillance technology working group, you know, there's there were 141 people that submitted comments out of the 141, you know, six to seven percent of them were opposed to to this.

Now, as as somebody who see the benefit, you also see where where the community and how they are feeling.

What do you take of that?

I mean, it's an unscientific poll, right?

It's just a question thrown out to the world.

Um, submitted the written stuff.

Yeah, but I personally feel that people are opposed to something are probably gonna have stronger feelings about somebody that thinks something's okay or good.

So they're more apt to respond.

I can tell you that just personally, it's just anecdotal, like uh like that kind of unscientific poll is that I haven't heard anybody complaining to me personally about it, and they think it's a good idea.

That's just me anecdotally personal.

You probably all have your own experiences, and I'm sure you're hearing both sides of that coin.

Even if 100 and out of that 141 people that submitted comments were like we have we don't want anything to do with this.

It's it's just it's it's too dangerous, is too invasive and stuff like that.

Yeah, I mean, the one thing I think is is uh to keep in mind it's a pilot program, right?

Like we're gonna do this, and we've already agreed to come back to the council in one year's time to to review you know what the program's doing and everything, and probably gonna ask for more funding to review it.

So I would beg of this committee to the council to give us the opportunity to prove our trustworthiness.

I hope you trust us enough to do the right thing, and then we're gonna review this again in a year.

We've already made that that promise.

Let me just make a clarifying point too, counselor.

I I've heard it mentioned a few times as the drone responding first and then an officer responding second.

I just kind of want to get away from that mindset.

The drone is a first responder, is not intended to replace a police officer, period, unless the drone gets there and recognizes there's not an issue anymore.

Any priority one, priority two, something that's active, that's an emergency shooting, stabbing, robbery, we all know the calls.

They're gonna be sent simultaneously.

But the benefit of the drone is it's gonna get there most likely within 30 to 60 seconds by the time that dispatcher even ends her broadcast dispatching that police officer.

If the police officer's at the building or on lunch break, probably long before he even gets back in this patrol car to respond there.

So now we have eyes on the scene already long before the officers ever even get there.

If it's a low-level call, a loud car parked in wherever playing loud music, and patrol is so busy they can't address that call and it's waiting for hours or whatever.

The drone is available, there's no high priority calls.

Patrol is busy clearing up a lot of other low-level calls or stuck on investigations or a major crime scene, what have you?

That drone will be able to go and at least see if that vehicle is still in that area.

So that issue may still be existing, whereas without the drone, you'd be waiting several hours for the officer to get there.

So I don't I just don't want us to think about the drone replacing.

We're gonna send the drone to every call first and then a cop second, they're gonna work together.

Lieutenant, can I ask you technical question?

Sure.

Um, so pilot has part one of seven, therefore, line of sight is no longer a thing.

What's the range on each of the vehicles?

And if I remember back to our prior committee meeting, were you thinking quadrants, or what would the layout be?

So initially we're starting with one.

We want to call crawl walk run, right?

We're gonna start with one unit.

I think we've kind of mapped it out to cover the entire city.

If we build this pilot program, it becomes a success.

The community starts recognizing the worth.

Uh, I think five of them stationed throughout the city spread out would cover most of the city.

So long-term goals like to get to five.

But we were we want to start with one and see how that works.

And where would the one roughly be in the city?

We're working now somewhere up near the Woodlawn uh reservoir area on top of one of the uh water buildings up there.

I think that's nothing set in stone, it's not there yet, but that's our thoughts, it's probably a good idea.

We're gonna it depends on how long, uh possibly even the new public safety building.

That's discussions we had, but it's not ready.

Yep.

Thank you.

So if there is there a mechanism to to Chief to control what a drone can record.

Because okay, so we can we can turn the recording on and off.

Okay, so going, you can turn that off.

Yes.

Coming once the situation is settled, you can turn it off.

Yeah.

So that's good.

But what if you know, say something is happening in front of City Hall, right?

And the park a lot across this street.

Would is there a way to just focus on that situation and not record everything else in the surrounding area?

That's no, I don't think so.

It's gonna be just like any other camera, right?

If you happen to catch something in the background, you're gonna happen to catch it in the background.

But the policy is gonna be if it's if you're going to the front steps of City Hall, you're not supposed to be looking at the at the parking lot across the street.

You know, if if you go to a certain angle and you happen to catch part of it, yeah, but you shouldn't be stopping in the parking lot first or after.

Yeah, and and and I'm asking that question, Chief, because when you look at the concern of the public, is it's it's part of the concern is being involved in a business that you shouldn't be involved in in terms of now you are getting recorded when you should have when you you have no business being recorded, and that's why I say you you are focusing on an issue that is in front of City Hall, but across the street, I'm getting recorded, and I'm not part of what's happening.

So I I don't know how you how you address that.

Because that's that's where privacy it does, right?

And it would depend on what what you're doing across the street, right?

You're you know, you're smoking a cigarette where you're not supposed to be smoking a cigarette or or drinking a beer, you're not supposed to be drinking a beer.

But if you just shot somebody and we happen to catch it on video, then we're gonna want to use that.

When does the dash cams come on for the vehicles?

I've never used a dash cam, so I I'm not sure.

Council to go back to your point with the camera recording things.

This the same can be said about the cops cameras as well, too, right?

I mean, I don't know of a time where somebody said, geez, I wish there wasn't a cops camera at this location.

You know what I'm saying?

So I think I you're gonna inadvertently catch some things for sure, but that's the same for every camera we have in this city.

Except those don't inadvertently catch backyards, right?

The cops cameras don't go over someone's backyard.

So I guess I have two concerns.

One is misidentifying somebody, right?

So if someone calls and says, you know, we have a black female in her early 30s causing trouble in this backyard, that describes both Rashida and Patrona.

Like that ages?

Right?

Early 70s.

But but I I do I do get concerned that we are misidentifying somebody, and then on the other side of that, and I don't mean to be flippant here, but we are we also probably will catch footage of someone in their backyard thinking that they're in the privacy of their own hot tub deck, whatever it might be.

So, what do we do with the footage that flies over?

She doesn't have a hot tub.

But what do we do with the footage that flies over someone's backyard and the woman is topless and suntanning, right?

Flying point, no, it's a great point, counselor.

I'm not I'm not right disputing the point.

Flying from point A to point B, the camera's gonna be positioned forward.

When we get the only reason we should be recording somebody's backyard is if we have a call there and a purpose to be recording that backyard.

Or you're chasing somebody that is jumping through backyards.

Well, correct, but that would be no different than if we were chasing them on a body camera.

It would also be recording as we go through the backyard.

But but if you are hovering above, you know, uh houses are so close together.

If you are hovering above, you could be recording the next door neighbor who's sunbathing and have no business with the next door neighbor.

But because it's they are right there in the proximity, and you can't you can't manipulate the camera to only focus on the house in in focus.

You see what I'm saying?

No, it's a great point.

Right.

But also, if there's if there's a specific event happening, we're not gonna be recording it zoomed way out.

You would hope we're not because that quality of that video is not gonna be very detailed, right?

Our whole purpose when we record is to get in as close as you can to see all the details of what's happening.

So you have a great point.

Is it possible to record somebody else's backyard while you're focusing on this backyard for sure?

Absolutely.

But more than likely we're gonna be zoomed in enough that it should only focus on the one yard and the actual event that's happening in that specific area.

Uh this is this is the committee meeting.

It's just not yeah, yeah.

But the recording of the flight between point A and point B is something we are willing to negotiate, right?

That is something that it's my opinion that we'd be better off having that video in case somebody makes a complaint that you're looking at my backyard.

We could go back and review it.

The CRB could, the attorney general's office could review and say, nope, they absolutely weren't looking down.

But that that point is of in-transit video is clearly open for negotiation.

Yes, we're not gonna.

If you don't have it, you don't hold it.

I also think I'm concerned because nothing's hack proof these days, so I I get worried about us having data of people not doing anything wrong, right?

I don't know.

Um maybe I'm over worrying about that, but I get where people are coming from that they feel like something's flying over their house, they don't know why.

Um because we do get those calls.

I think there was a drone over BD Street two nights ago.

Woman calls and says, why is it here?

I I can't answer that question.

It's gonna be not even be ours, right?

That's the it's gonna be pretty quick posting, and I don't know the exact time frame, Brian.

I don't know if you do of the the dashboard that people will be able to go look at that and see why that drone is flying.

That's a big delay, right?

I think we have flexibility in setting it because it's something that happens automatically.

We can set parameters.

I mean, axon can set parameters.

So I think we have a choice in whether we want it to go.

I think most agencies do a two-hour window after the flight, it will be posted on their dashboard, but I think there's flexibility in that.

I have a question, and just bear with me with this question, because I'm corley.

I know Chief, you said you don't you never use the dash cam, but has any other Chiefs out here ever use the dash cam?

No, don't you traffic guy?

Nobody nobody uses jack dash, yes.

Uh traffic cars.

So they're activated by triggers.

First one is speed over 80, your light bar in full uh red and blue, and uh physical activation.

Right, so physical.

So you could be an officer and say, hey, boom, I I need to activate.

Okay, yeah.

So with that process, those actual footage is still uploaded to the same axon, correct?

Right.

And that's the same with the body cameras cameras.

They're still uploading.

Okay.

All three to the same platform, Axon.

Evidence.com.

Yep.

Okay.

Yeah, that's right.

Thank you.

That's why I brought the experts.

But uh to up to that point, there's only certain cars that have the uh traffic dash cameras, right?

Yeah, I think it's just a traffic traffic.

Yeah, that's why you do have it.

I never worked traffic.

I've I only wrote a very few tickets too.

Me included.

No.

Um you know, Chief, going back to the public hearing yesterday.

I think you know the biggest concern last night were were were God rails, you know, guardrails around the practice and and the use of drones, you know.

I think as we go back here, if if you and your team could really sit down and build that level of comfort, especially from the public as they read, you know, the the policy, you know, to be able to say, okay, here's where SPD will not go to use the drone, and here's what is allowed to spell it out clearly.

I think with the matter desensitive.

I'm not I'm I'm sure you're not going to completely highlight everything and and and spell out everything, but just developing as much as clarity as possible in terms of the guardrail around the use and thing that that would that would help a lot.

Yeah, I think unless there's any uh opposition to it, the the things that we did suggest that we could get those into the policy now, and then we can get provide that to you all, and you can take a look at it and see how you feel about that.

Okay.

I would like to get those done before we do anything else.

Last question for me is is how do we how do we make sure we a little in in terms of maybe public education?

How do we you know calm the nerve down a little bit because I I just like everybody, I'm nervous too.

Yeah, right.

So if we had uh per your request, we did a public education.

Uh Tony Burley from Neighborhood Watch sent out uh notice to all his constituents citywide.

Uh we had a night, uh there was a lot more media there than there was people.

I did a uh the interview afterwards, explaining the program then it went out on all three channels.

Um probably some extra radio channels I'm not aware of.

And uh what was this, Chief?

It was a drone as a first responder uh on TV radio, but uh Tony Burelli recorded that and it's still available on his website.

I believe we provided that to you.

If not, we I we can um of what the the educational program was.

Uh we can uh Tony's got that on his website.

We could put uh try to look into putting a link on our website to his if the if one doesn't already exist so people could go and view it.

And it explains all those things that we talked about.

It's basically the presentation that Sergeant Wells did on this the TV screen where you know what the map looks like, how the flight what why we're flying, how long we're up, all those all that data will be available.

So turn it to Gorelli, that that's the neighborhood watch.

Yes, sir.

Right group.

Have we made any way to to TNT's picture?

I know that uh captains go to uh TNT meetings, have we given them the opportunity to say okay, as as captain that I coming to TNT.

You can specifically TNT no TNT.

But we could, right?

Yeah, could could we in the next month or so you know with the capacity to make sure that the the captains I equipped with the information and let them be explicit saying that you know I'm here to answer any question you may have about drones?

So just to be clear that uh they're not going to the TNT meetings anymore.

Um so I guess that would be a special trip.

Is it there's no in-person meetings?

Is that what you're saying?

No, uh, apparently it was stated that due to the budget cuts, they would no longer be attending the oh yeah, but we were gonna do a public outreach, we would uh we would have to make that happen.

Okay, could we just make sure you didn't think it was I made it no?

Okay.

To where we have a question.

Yeah.

So I've heard the discussion that um drones are not gonna replace police officers.

Whoever you're aware of the incidents that we had last year, Walton Second North Street with the old Tommy's bar, and went on for every weekend for many months.

People coming out of the bar, they were intoxicated, partying out in the streets.

I was there.

You saw a lot of people having a good time.

You saw people next door at a gay bar outside two, and we would call and call, wait till maybe one o'clock in the morning.

I was there one o'clock in the morning, police didn't come, and they did come.

Someone at the gay bar made a comment to me that they were gonna get a ticket because they were parked on the wrong side.

So let's the scenario is okay, it happens now, and are we calling a call again?

Uh, but because we are understaffed and many officers are still over at Armory Square, we are gonna use a drone.

And the drone is gonna be over there, and they're gonna see a lot of people, and they're gonna see people like me gonna be hanging out there.

So a lot of it are gonna feel now.

Well, we should have had the police officer, we got the drone, so now uh now our privacy is out for the public to see who we are.

So can we expect that if this incident, whether it's on Will Street or on the South Side, any place else, where 50, 60 people are gathering, they're making a lot of racket, people are complaining.

I'm sorry, but we can't be out there, so we're gonna get a drone and it may catch it.

So not all this information is there.

Are you gonna share that with the media when they say, oh, geez, we want the story, Chief?

So to your concern about people's privacy are in a bar, they don't want to be seen.

Um, we're not gonna release that to the public with that.

And if we had to release it because it was foiled or whatever, we have the capability of redaction, which blurs faces, license plates, all those things.

So that so people that aren't involved's identity wouldn't be known.

Okay, so the media is not gonna say, can we have a copy of this for our own newscast?

We're not gonna do it.

No, god no.

Okay.

So we're able to blur out the ladies.

We can redraft, we can react.

Thank you.

There was a question on the next comment.

Just uh we have a whole team that redacts video.

So for um the question that was asked as far as uh um mental health crisis that we have in in the city.

Um at what point would the drone be used if it would not be used, would it be used at that point?

I'd like to fall back on what Lieutenant Williams said, right?

That the drone's not gonna replace a police officer, but it could get you there.

You know, if the reports, you know, somebody leaning over a bridge or somebody's hanging off a bill, you could get there uh quicker with the drone for sure, almost almost every time, to try to assess the situation so that when the officers arrive, they're gonna know what what positions they should take up, what actions they might want to take.

It's just uh it's an enhancer, but it's not that um somebody with a mental health crisis problem, it's not gonna replace a police officer.

I'm gonna ask it.

Since we've been compromised as a city, and especially through the police department, how would that affect this data?

So this goes on to the uh evidence.com.

There's nothing's been compromised, and hopefully nothing will be compromised.

Um it's not the difference is the other data has the ability to share that and a network.

This one you have to give specific permission.

I think that's the key difference.

This one requires specific position, uh permission.

So we let the attorney general's office see it.

We let uh the CRB if they need it for uh an investigation to see it, and then our staff can see it as well.

Packers are good though.

But can but can IC or Border Patrol get into our um uh acts on stuff?

No.

Who manages?

Does the department own Evident.com?

No, I'm thinking I'm gonna fall back to Sergeant Heinback.

She's our IT person.

I just went to her right there.

It's an accent site.

What's that?

It is an action site.

Yeah, but we're not gonna go with CRV, you know.

Yeah, I'm trying to check it out.

See what we got there.

Who owns Epden.com's arts.

Axon.

Oh, okay.

You know, I if I can mention something, I think maybe President Hudson was here, but this uh conversation and committee meetings reminded me of my first time on the council when we had the same concerns brought up about the cops camera.

Exact the same concerns.

And I took a tour of uh West End neighborhood, Gifford Street, and with uh in fact with uh Tim Canous from the Surgery Suppose Standard, and I asked every resident of that neighborhood that I talked to that afternoon if they were in favor or not in favor of those cops cameras, and it was like a unanimous decision.

They were in favor of extra eyes on their neighborhood to protect them as far as public safety goes.

And so this is sort of reminds me of the same thing.

I don't know.

President Hudson, you remember that too.

You know, I probably will know this because of my boyish good looks, but I was around long enough to know I saw that battle, and that was the same exact same thing, counselor.

That there was a huge pushback, huge public outcry, and that script is completely flipped to the point where people are I want them in my neighborhood, where how come we don't have them?

Every single neighborhood watch meeting, I go TNT meeting that comes up.

I want a cop's camera on my corner on my corner.

Um so I think maybe us counselors can talk to our neighborhood watch people and see where they stand on drones, too.

Well, I'm still stuck on where you say good looks.

Uh any other question?

Any other questions?

I just hear one.

You know, some block areas in our neighborhoods.

We have problems with high-speeding vehicles.

And your keycal has been great.

Will there be a time where you might use a drone just uh oversee you keep a record of vehicles that are speeding, like on up on Oak Street or Park Street?

No, not just for record keeping purposes.

Okay.

Maybe trying to catch someone who persists.

We had a detail out and we were looking for the the motorcycles, the ATVs, okay, uh group of people because there's people that hang out in car gangs too, just like motorcycles.

And if we had a report that they were terrorized in a neighborhood and we had a detail out, I could see using the drone for that, yes.

Okay, thank you.

Any others?

Well, Chief, uh send us the updated uh policy with the recommendation of the discussion we had incorporating the uh the public hearing yesterday, and we'll reconsider this uh two weeks from yesterday.

I thank you for your time.

No problem.

Thank you.

Thank you all.

Thank you.

That will conclude our meeting.